The day didn’t differ in any way from other ordinary weekdays. From the Młynówka came the curses of rafters, the thud of barrels being rolled and the rattle of hammers from the lane beside the church, the cries of stallholders from a side street, and the bleating of sheep and squealing of pigs from the shambles. The monotonous voice of the magister and the voices of the pupils repeating the lesson were lost in the hubbub of the town. Although the voices were barely audible, Wendel Domarasc knew what lessons the boys were repeating. For he had held the post of rector in the Collegiate Church of the Holy Cross in Opole. Had written the school curriculum.

Si vitam inspicias hominum, si denique mores,

Cum culpant alios, nemo sine crimine vivit.

Instinct warned him just in time. Wendel Domarasc sprang up from the table, seized the reports of the agents and tossed them into the fire. A moment before the door was broken down and flew off its hinges, the magister took a blue flacon from a dresser. He managed to drink the contents before the thugs rushing into the chamber twisted his arms behind his back, caught him by the hair and bent his head over. The rector wheezed.

“Let him go.”

Although he’d never seen him before, Domarasc knew at once who the man standing in front of him was. He guessed it by the black clothing and the black shoulder-length hair. By the strange, seemingly birdlike physiognomy. And the look of a devil.

“Poisons are like women,” said the Wallcreeper, raising the blue vial and turning it over in his fingers. “In two respects. Primo: they can’t be trusted; they will betray you when you need them most. Secundo: they ought to be replaced often. For newer and fresher ones, because they lose all their value when they age.

“You will not flee from me into death,” he added with a hideous smile. “Your stale poison won’t kill you. You’ll suffer at most from diarrhoea. And stomach ache. You’re already getting torsions, I see. Sit him up or he’ll fall over.”

The bruisers searched the chamber, which they did with noticeable expertise. The Wallcreeper closed the window, cutting the chamber off from the hubbub of the street. The voices of the pupils repeating their lesson gained in strength because of it. Individual words could now be made out.

Nolo putes pravos homines peccata lucrari;

Temporibus peccata latent, sed tempore parent.

“Disticha catonis,” said the Wallcreeper, recognising the words. “Nothing changes. For ages you’ve been drumming wise words into those boys’ heads, over and over the same. You, scholar, were also once flogged in time to those couplets. But it turns out, you weren’t beaten hard enough. The lesson wasn’t learned; Cato’s wisdom evaded your mind. Temporibus peccata latent, sed tempore parent. What, did you think you could endlessly hide your practices from us? O spy of spies, O notorious Shadow, O faceless man? Did you hope you’d remain forever unpunished? That was a vain hope, Domarasc, vain. In other words: abandon all hope. Hope is the mother of fools.”